Pindar
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Pindar. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
pin'dar, a Greek lyric poet. He lived about 522-443 B. C. He was a citizen of Thebes. He claimed descent from Cadmus the father of letters. Pindar learned to compose to the accompaniment of the flute. His earlier odes were so profuse in allusions to mythology that a rival poet advised him to "sow with the hand, not with the sack." His reputation in Greece was such that when Pausanias, king of Sparta, was burning Thebes, some one wrote an inscription over his door, "Burn not the house of Pindar the poet," thus saving it from general destruction. The same anecdote is told of Alexander's sack of Thebes. Among the subjects of Pindar's muse were odes in honor of Apollo to be chanted in the temple at Delphi, hymns to various deities, poems expressing prayer or praise, processional songs, chorus songs for maidens, choral dance songs, songs for festive occasions in praise of some distinguished guest, banquet or drinking songs, dirges, etc. Some idea of the diction of the greatest master of lyrical poetry of all ages may be had from a few expressions, as: a cloak, " a warm remedy for winds;" "excellent as water, bright as gold, brilliant as the noonday sun;" the poet "mixes wine in a bowl;" for one still on his feet, "he hath his foot in his shoe;" "sane happiness;" "wealth set with virtues;" "love thy friend and hate thy foe;" "rivalries of peace;" "the chamber of the hours;" "the rushing strength of waves;" "the paths of the deep;" "Etna--pillar of the sky, nurse of snows;" "the golden and deep purple rays of the pansy;" a song--"cunning work, blending gold, ivory and coral." In 1906 word went out that 380 new fragments of Pindar's poetry (paeans) had been found on old papyrus rolls in the ruins of a town in Egypt. Pindar was a traveler and an observer. His conception of the poetic mission is well expressed by himself: "No sculptor, I, to fashion images that shall stand idly on one pedestal for aye. No, go thou forth, sweet song of mine, on every freighted ship, on each light bark."
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the great Greek lyric poet; born in or near Thebes, in Bœotia, about 522 B. C. He was of a noble family, 目 PINDAR skilled in music, and learned his father's art of flute playing. At Athens he was a pupil of Lasus of Hermione. Pindar composed choral songs for princes and states in all parts of Greece; for which, as was the custom, he received money and gifts. Yet he did not become a mere hireling, and spoke truth fearlessly to all. He did not live at courts, nor take part in public affairs. Pindar celled in all varieties of choral poetry hymns to the gods, pæans, odes for cessions, drinking songs, etc. But only poems of his now extant are the "Epinikia, or Triumphal Odes," composed in celebration of victories at the great public games, the Olympian, Pythian, Nemean, and Isthmian. They are marked by an extraordinary variety of style and expression. No two odes have the same meter. Pindar attained the highest renown in his own age, and as a lyrical poet has no rival. When Thebes was destroyed by Alexander, the conqueror spared the house of Pindar. He died in 443 B. C.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Both accounts rest on the same ancient biographies, and the outline still holds: a Theban aristocrat, trained in flute and choral song, whose only complete surviving works are the four books of victory odes. The find Aiton's noted in 1906 came good — Grenfell and Hunt's Oxyrhynchus papyri, published in 1908, restored substantial stretches of the paeans that Collier's in 1921 still called lost, and further scraps of dithyrambs and maiden-songs have surfaced since, so the standard modern text (Snell and Maehler's) prints far more Pindar than either editor had. Dates have shifted slightly: scholars now usually give his birth as 518 B.C. and his death as around 438, since one datable ode falls after 443. The biggest change is in how he is read — Elroy Bundy's Studia Pindarica (1962) argued that the mythical digressions the old critics found rambling are governed throughout by the conventions of praise poetry, and the charming stories about Pausanias or Alexander sparing his house are now treated as legend.
Written for this edition, 2026.